Carrie Underwood Offers Early Ticket Access to 2016 Tour

“Idol was probably the most horrifying thing, because I had never been away from my hometown like that before,” she told Parade magazine in a new interview. “I was in L.A., of all places, by myself, putting myself out there, which is a scary thing for anybody to do.Look for Carrie to perform one of the songs from her latest effort Wednesday, November 4, when she co-hosts the 49th Annual CMA Awards live from Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena at 8 p.m.

It’s that voice that makes her the only truly unfadeable American Idol success story: a country-pop-rock superpower that sweeps in like the sanctified cyclone of her 2012 hit “Blown Away,” laying waste to drunken-lout fathers, abusive partners and cowboy casanovas before settling back into a honeysuckle breeze. Most of the 13 tracks center on the country star’s familiar themes: tight-knit working-class communities, trust in faith, and intense struggle, whether personal or social. Fans who are exhausted of all the demands of modern-day life may agree with what Underwood’s preaching in “Heartbeat”, song No. 4 on Storyteller. “People might think you are nuts talking … Fans who are exhausted of all the demands of modern-day life may agree with what Underwood’s preaching in “Heartbeat”, song No. 4 on Storyteller. “People might think you are nuts talking to yourself and telling yourself how awesome you are, but it helps to say, ‘I am strong’”. The album’s first single, “Smoke Break,” manages to incorporate all three in profiling a small-town, hard-working woman who scuffles to feed four children.

I feel like it’s a little cheesy, but that’s okay because it’s a baby Halloween costume. “My first plane ride was when I was going out to L.A. alone”. When you’re doing all the giving, the lyrics explain, “It’s hard to be a good wife, good mother and a good Christian.” No wonder the beleaguered, tee-totaling mom of the song sometimes needs “a stiff drink,” she confesses. The biggest earner of the American Idol series, this is her fifth album of shiny, overbearing country rock. “But it ended up being very personal and I think flawless for the album”. “I’ll probably never find the answers to those questions”.

Furthermore, “I know it might sound bad, but sometimes I need a smoke break.” Underwood, 32, is a seven-time Grammy Award winner who has recorded 21 No. 1 singles and sold 58 million records worldwide. Now that Taylor Swift makes pure pop, the country world is open for domination by Oklahoma’s Carrie Underwood. “The whole pregnancy was kind of like, ‘Well, I can’t exactly be out on tour and things like that like I would normally be.’ So, I definitely filled my time working in other ways”. But it smartly tips its crossover mix towards the rootsier feel of her first album, connecting with the narrative-driven creative renaissance currently being spearheaded by Miranda Lambert and Kacey Musgraves. She has never shied away from underscoring her faith and religious beliefs and lays them out for all to see. “It’s how I was raised,” she once told this writer. “I honestly believe there is something, somewhere, watching over me, whether it’s angels or God himself pointing me in the directions I need to go. That is not me”. “I think it had to be my doing to come in with the idea, or I would have resisted forever”, Underwood said. “But it’s just a question of how am I going to do this?

With its sharply-drawn teetotalers pushed to their limits, “Smoke Break” becomes a memorable 420 anthem without actually inhaling. “Church Bells” describes a Dallas-like scenario of an oil-man and his sweetheart, sitting in the back pew “all bruises covered in makeup, dark sunglasses,” at the tipping point in the most epic domestic-violence-revenge-murder ballad in years, splitting the difference between Martina McBride’s “Independence Day” and the Dixie Chicks “Goodbye, Earl,” but without the latter’s safety-valve of humor. This may have been the finale performance that sealed the deal for Underwood, whom Idol judge Simon Cowell once predicted would not only win the competition, but would go on to “sell more records than any other previous Idol winners“. “That was when Fifty Shades of Grey was coming out, like right around that time, and I’m like, ‘Christian’s off the list, babe, ‘” she explained with a laugh.

She insists “I wanna feel it like a kick drum” on “Heartbeat,” a head-turningly sexy four-by-four R&B jam that might impress Trey Songz. “Relapse” is a power ballad that kneels to Queen Bey. It was me!” “The girl-next-door quality she exudes isn’t an image,” confirmed Randy Lewis, who has covered country music for the Los Angeles Times since 1981. “It’s who she is.” On Nov. 4, for the eighth consecutive year, Underwood will co-host the Country Music Association’s live television broadcast with Brad Paisley. And “Choctaw County Affair” is a juicy slice of Seventies country-funk that nods to Bobbie Gentry’s “Ode to Billie Joe” and the news mama heard from Choctaw Ridge. Together, they are country’s King and Queen of Clean, which is why Underwood was the perfect choice to play Maria von Trapp in NBC’s 2013 production of “The Sound of Music.” The live three-hour holiday special attracted 44 million viewers but got a “thumbs down” from reviewers. “Sometimes critics forget that a whole lot of folks travel the middle road,” said Chrissie Dickinson, former editor of the Journal of Country Music. “Underwood has no problem traveling down that path.” While former country — and now pop star — Taylor Swift struts her cool, inviting such rock superstars as Mick Jagger and Alanis Morissette onstage to duet, Underwood downplays the flash.

As glamorous as she is onstage, she also gives off an honest, down-to-earth vibe in sweatpants and T-shirts. “I can’t hang with people like Lady Gaga,” she said. “I don’t fit in there. Otherwise, Underwood’s main songwriting wingman remains Music City A-lister Hillary Lindsey, who has been riding shotgun since Underwood’s first mega-hit, 2005’s “Jesus Take The Wheel.” She’s got nine co-writes here out of 13. As with much high-gloss, high-compression pop, the heavy-handed production gets fatiguing after a while, even when Underwood transcends it (see the corny yet undeniable letter to Daddy “The Girl You Think I Am”).

By the time she’s wailing about facing “25 to life” on the lam in “Mexico” in the wake of an unnamed crime that could be anything from coke-smuggling to hedge fund hustling, you have half a mind to snitch. 2015 may not bring everything that Back to the Future II promised it would: flying cars, self-lacing shoes, we don’t see ’em happening over the next 12 months. (Then again, don’t bet against Nike.) But this year will definitely pack plenty of punch when it comes to cultural happenings. But in the end, I’m a country artist, and we wanted people to know that right off the bat.” “I think that she is probably the best female vocalist to come out of Nashville, maybe ever,” said her friend Miranda Lambert, the CMA’s five-time Female Vocalist of the Year. “The mystery about her is that she does have this girl-next-door image, but then she comes out in fishnets. Mad Max will roar back out of the apocalypse while Mad Men rides off into the sunset, rock’s Antichrist Superstar and hip-hop’s Yeezus will rise again. She’s not fake at all.” Since winning “American Idol” in 2005, Underwood has made a career of celebrating the old-fashioned values she grew up near the tiny rural town of Checotah, Okla. The population hovers at just under 3,500, and the “beauty shop” is nestled in the town hardware store. “The people in Oklahoma are not like any other people anywhere else,” she told me. “I know there are good people everywhere, but it seemed like there were more good, happy people in Oklahoma.

The Underwoods resided in the same house for more than 30 years, raised a few cattle (“We’re not the croppin’ kind,” Carrie explained), and the singer’s grandfather lived five blocks down the street. In high school, Underwood was a well-rounded student, the salutatorian of her graduating class who balanced athleticism and cheerleading with her studies. At college at Oklahoma’s Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, where she studied broadcasting, she joined a sorority, volunteered for hospice care, and participated in beauty pageants and talent shows.

Throughout history, from Roy Acuff to Dolly Parton, country music culled its biggest stars from its own brethren — people who grew up working the land or blue-collar jobs and sang about hard times. No matter how much money they made doing it (and Underwood is reported to be the biggest “American Idol” earner of all time, with a total career net worth of more than $110 million), country stars were symbolic ordinary people who never “got above their raising,” or forgot their roots.

But her genuineness quickly won over Music City and made her legions of new fans who had never seen her on the television show. “The adolescent girls and college-age women who fell in love with her a decade ago on ‘American Idol’ are now entering college, or starting careers, or getting married and raising families,” Dickinson said. “But Carrie is still a relatable figure to a lot of them. It’s easy to imagine her laughing and eating pizza with her gal pals or playing softball at the church picnic.” In 2010, Underwood married Mike Fisher, then a hockey player for the Ottawa Senators, now with the Nashville Predators. In June, when their dogs accidentally locked themselves in the car with the infant, Underwood didn’t wait for help — she broke a window to free them.